The advertising of goods and services has undergone historical changes that are reflected by intertwining technology and trademark law. In pre-historic communities the quality of goods and services was associated with a “mark” that represented the individual, family, tribe, or group of artisans that produced the goods. In particular, “marks” were applied to bricks, pottery and roof tiles circa 3000 BC.
Between the 12th and 14th centuries, trade guilds began using trademarks, and the English law on trademarks, i.e. Bakers Marking Law, became black letter law. During this period statutes were passed that enabled merchants whose goods had been pirated to provide evidence of ownership using marks appearing on the goods.
As printing developed in the 15th and 16th centuries, advertising expanded from the reliance on trademarks to include handbills, and in the 17th century, advertisements started to appear in weekly newspapers in England. These early print ads were mainly to promote books and newspapers in England, which had become increasingly affordable due to the invention of the printing press.
Regretfully, the advent of the printing press also brought with it false advertising, especially as it related to drugs. To combat this influx of false advertising, there was a reliance on marks or trademarks that authenticated that the goods received were produced by a reputable manufacturer.
In the 20th century, advertising continued to change with the advent of the radio and television, which resulted in sponsorship by one or more businesses for radio or television content. In the late 80's and 90's the success of cable television with a number of different channels that catered to particular demographic segments provided a new media source for targeted advertising. Generally, the cost of television and radio advertising is relatively high and this creates a relatively high barrier to entry. Therefore, those businesses that elect to use TV and radio for advertising are established companies that have invested money in developing a brand or a reputation, which results in a recognizable trademark.
In the 21st century, the popularity of the Internet has produced a new media outlet for advertising. Currently, the Internet supports advertising on the World Wide Web and advertising using e-mail. Unlike television or radio advertising, Internet-based advertising does not have the same barriers to entry, so an individual with a credit card and $5 can begin a Web based advertising campaign, and an individual with a list of valid e-mail addresses can begin an e-mail advertising campaign.
As a result, we currently live in an age of unsolicited e-mail, i.e. spam, and web-based search solutions that overwhelm the user with information. To simply control unsolicited e-mail, an individual uses “spam” filters to remove the unsolicited e-mail. Even with spam filters, unsolicited e-mail still finds its way to the user.
And as it relates to the use of the web-based search engines, an individual has to interact with a personal computer and sift through the information before finding information that is pertinent to their search. Advertising on a web-based search engine is dependent on the “relevance” of the surrounding web content and the traffic that a particular website receives, and the individual is overwhelmed with information. Although search engines and browsers are capable of storing the individuals search history and commonly accessed URLs, these search tools simply add to the information glut.
Thus, there is a need for receiving desirable advertising that overcomes the limitations of spam. Additionally, there is a need for receiving simplified web-based search results. Additionally, the Internet provides such a low barrier to entry for advertising that there is a substantial amount of false advertising. Thus, there is also a need to minimize false advertising on the Internet.
Furthermore, the growing popularity of mobile handsets that are Internet enabled has further exacerbated some of the problems that were associated with a user's PC. For example, the search process on a mobile handset is limited by the screen size of the mobile handset, so that the information glut experience of a PC desktop simply cannot be supported on the mobile handset. Additionally, the reading of unsolicited e-mail on a mobile handset comes at a substantial price because the user is charged for the number of “minutes” used or the amount of data that is downloaded.
Thus, there is a need to overcome the limitations associated with the mobile search process and the receiving of unsolicited e-mails or other such content on a mobile handset. Further still, the interface on a mobile handset may not permit a user to simply key in an entry, like the PC keyboard. Therefore, the user is left to hunt and peck for the proper letter or number, severely limiting the user's searching ability. Thus, there is a need for a user to conduct a user-defined search that overcomes individual searching limitations.
Finally, the current state of the art of mobile search must be actively enabled by the user, and the user must actively input search terms or search categories to find desirable information. This process is not trivial because the approach requires interfacing with a small keypad, inputting text or commands into a small screen, waiting for the text or command to be processed by the carrier network, sifting through the carrier generated output on the small screen, selecting the hyperlink of interest, waiting for the network to transmit the information associated with the hyperlink, sifting through the information on the same small screen, determining if the information is desirable, and then beginning the entire search process over again if the information is not desirable. Thus, there is a need for a simplified mobile search process that provides desirable information with minimal user input.